No No No No! Hell is a fucking terrible thing. ...I believe it's a reality. That doesn't make it a good, desirable or pleasant reality. What you're clearly not willing to contemplate is why it should even be a reality.

But that's the point some of us make: why would a benevolent god create hell? The only logic answer is that a benevolent god would NOT create hell. So either god is malevolent or does not exist. Any other answer requires huge amounts of bullshit and mental gymnastics, if not delusions.

Here though, it sounds to me more like you're worming out of it with yourself. Having faith that Hell is a good thing, versus feeling/believing that it is a good thing...could you explain the difference?

No No No No! Hell is a fucking terrible thing. How could you possibly not get that, from all I've said? Why did Jesus come and suffer it in our place, if not for the fact it's terrible?

I believe it's a reality. That doesn't make it a good, desirable or pleasant reality. What you're clearly not willing to contemplate is why it should even be a reality.

I mean the existence of Hell being good in the Grand Design, not the prospect of actually going there being good from our perspective. Clearly, God wills its existence, from a Christian perspective. And from a Christian perspective, that makes it good, even if we don't understand why with our feeble human intellects and morals.

EDIT: I made an edit on the last post. Does my comment on amorality make more sense now, even if you disagree?

[Or it is a complete abdication of moral judgment. He's saying that despite having the ability to tell what is morally acceptable (Gen 3:22) he refuses and instead leaves it up to someone else, a "higher" authority.

This was C.S. Lewis' concept of what hell must have been like. In the Screwtape Letters, he imagined a vast, infernal bureaucracy full of agents who were without moral judgment and whose wills were subsumed - devoured - by that of Satan. He saw that as ultimate totalitarian tyranny. This is where his pal, JRR Tolkein, got his idea for the Nazgul. They were portrayed similarly - empty vessles who existed only to carry out the will of Sauron.

So given all that, it is clear xians agree that Miles' approach is not just wrong, but evil. He is throwing away Eve's gift and sacrifice and the one thing that makes him like the gods.

Not at all. I believe that my sense of justice, right and wrong exist because I was created in God's image. But an image is just that, it isn't a perfect replica. It's why I do the wrong thing even when I know its wrong. Same as you, same as everyone.

I don't ignore justice in this lifetime and hope God will sort it out. But I do accept that it is God who will bring ultimate justice. We disagree on what that will be, but, hey...that's unavoidable when you don't believe in ultimate justice at all.

Your attitude leads to evil. Your morals lead to evil. Historically, this is demonstrated by the often repeated "I was just following orders" plea. It was not accepted at Nurenburg and if there is a god, I cannot imagine it would be accepted by him either. The path you are on leads to hell.

What about your mom?[1] When you were little, didn't you feel goodness and love from her? Are you saying it wasn't really from her? And what about you now? Do you not have kids? And do you not give them goodness and love? Are you saying that the love you feel for them does not really come from you? Does the love and goodness you feel from them not really come from them, but from god?

Goodness and love originate with God. That is indeed what I believe. Those things exist. Because they do, my parents were able to be good and loving. I am able to be good and loving, but only because those things exist. You, presumably, believe those qualities evolved as a necessary part of human development. So i guess I could ask, does the love you feel for Mrs Screwtape come from you, or from the first sentinent being that for some reason felt love?

If so, then what's the point of anything? If we cannot do good and love on our own, then what are we? Are we are just meat puppets? Robots? This means your god created us to be entirely helpless, useless and dependent. I have to say, Miles, I find your theology to be completely nihilistic and emotionally crippling.

That's because, as is so often the case, you believe it to be something it isn't.

Not at all. I believe that my sense of justice, right and wrong exist because I was created in God's image. ...

That is not what the Bible says. It says we were created ignorant of right and wrong, good and evil. That knowledge is what we gained (in the story) when Eve and Adam ate from the Tree of Knowledge (of good and evil). That's kind of the point of the story, no?

Personally, I can say that, along with the scientific evidence that I have examined and the satisfactory proof that the Bible is the basis for all Truth, it is an ”awareness” that cements it all. The Bible refers to it as the spiritual connection between God and man but the result of that connection is an “awareness” of His being. People here often refer to it simply as a ‘hunch’ or a ‘nebulous feeling’ however “awareness” is a real conscious function and cannot be discarded solely because it is unidentifiable under a microscope.

Personally, I can say that the total lack of scientific evidence pointing to God, and the unbelievably low amount of proof that the bible is 'the basis of all truth', are reasons enough to discard the belief in the Christian God. There is plenty more to go on, but those are enough for me.

But who's discarding the awareness you speak of? I'm certainly not. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that feeling some sort of awareness might be hard wired in. But I'm not accepting the first explanation that comes along, nor am I accepting what I was raised to believe (but never did). I'm just looking at all the possible explanations for it. And I don't find the 'god is real and he is the awareness' explanation to be valid for many reasons but I do find the following theory explains all the facts surrounding religious belief quite well.

The awareness you are talking about is nothing more than the many years of Christian indoctrination you've received functioning inside a brain that looks for causative agents in every corner of it's existence. All of our brains look for causative agents, but those that are told that there really is an agent out there are playing with a brain that is already hard wired to accept such a thing. Why do you think it's so easy to get kids to believe in Santa Claus? The Easter bunny? The Tooth Fairy? God? They look for causative agents and they believe what parents tell them.

Why do you think there are so many religions out there that have been believed in just as seriously as yours for just as long, if not longer than yours? Because it happens all over the world from culture to culture. Muslims are humans that look for causative agents, and Islam plays to it. Hindu's are humans that look for causative agents and Hinduism plays to it. Christianity is EXACTLY the same. And they play to it early and often because if they introduce the god concept after a child has the capability to reason through it and question it, it won't take hold as easily. How many religions out there do you hear saying 'lets not push this idea on kids... let's wait until they're old enough to make their own decision and reason it through'? Zero.

If all you have is a 'feeling' or an 'awareness', then that's not enough. It's just not. If person X swears up and down that they have an 'awareness' of Jesus, and person Y swears up and down that they have an 'awareness' of Mohammed, a reasonable explanation for this discrepancy is that they're both wrong, and that they are both experiencing the exact sort of thing I talked about above, is it not? Especially since this 'awareness' is the only thing we really have to go on. And even if there really IS something to be 'aware' of; neither of them, nor any other religious person for that matter, has any sort of proof advantage over the other. So claiming to know what it is, is the effect of the indoctrination into whatever religion they believe in.

The awareness you feel has been nurtured, trained and practiced for years in the church, and just like anything else, you've become good at it. Like the person who becomes good at meditation after practicing it for years. You're brain has a hard time seeing it any other way now.

The observation that endorphin levels would increase if I were to meditate on how much Jesus loves me does not constitute falsifying evidence for the experience because that increase in endorphins takes place in the context of normal physiological processes in the brain.

My point is that the positive emotional response you attribute to a "relationship with god" is likely due to completely internal, natural occurrences within your own brain. You basically admit the same with your statement above.

One important thing to note about your illustration is that it is the note the boy received and not the boy’s subsequent emotional state that is analogous to my relational experience with Christ. In my argument I have said that I have a relational experience and I interpret this experience as providing me with evidence that the Christian God exists – in the illustration, the boy received a note and interpreted the note to mean that the girl was in love with him (it was his interpretation that then resulted in his emotional state). In my case, my emotional state already exists and based on my judgement of its reality I interpret it as providing me with evidence that the Christian God exists.

It seems you are merely arguing semantics. If your emotional state already existed prior to your faith (which would be extremely difficult to establish considering you acquired your faith at age 5), then how can you use your emotional state as evidence for god? In other words, if you were already blissful and then began a "relationship with god" while remaining blissful, what is it which you attribute to god? Was not your mother's testimony to you as a boy essentially the equivalent of receiving a note (per my example) that god loves you, and the emotions you've felt since a result of your interpretation of it?

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I would like to offer you a second illustration: keep everything in the original illustration the same (the note, the beautiful girl, the boy’s crush, and the peripheral circumstances), but this time assume that the note is actually meant for the boy. The question I have for you would be: in the second illustration does the boy have any more justification for concluding that the girl is in love with him? I would say no. The note has the exact same evidential value in the first illustration as it does in the second; whether his conclusion about the girl’s love for him is true or not is irrelevant to the determination of the evidential value of the note. This is what I am trying to say about my relational experience – whether or not it is based on a real Christian God is irrelevant to the determination of its evidential value.

Perhaps he is no more justified in his conclusion in either example upon first receiving the note, but the one thing the boy has in his favor is that he can easily achieve confirmation (positive or negative) by speaking directly with the girl and hearing her direct response. You, unfortunately, do not have such convenience in determining the legitimacy of your good feelings for god.But let's say he is unable to confirm it by getting a direct response from her[1]. This is more in line with a believer's situation with god. The boy would go to his grave believing the girl loved him, and would experience whatever emotions would accompany such a belief. The biggest difference is that, at the very least, the boy holds a proclamation of love written by the girl's own hand. You hold, essentially, a metaphorical note written by your mother that god loves you.

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If my judgement is incorrect then in my opinion I am in possession of a legitimate piece of evidence that supports a false conclusion. There is nothing contradictory about having legitimate evidence for a false conclusion – its happens all the time in court. I’m sure all of us can think of court cases (e.g. Dustin Paxton, O.J. Simpson, Oscar Pistorius) where it seems pretty certain even with superficial knowledge of the case that the person is guilty, but that doesn’t mean that the court cannot admit evidence that can support the person’s innocence. It just means that at the end of the day the evidence supporting the accused guilt will likely outweigh the evidence for his innocence.

It is the legitimacy of your evidence that is in question here. How can you (per your example, in a court of law) establish that it is legitimate?

While you are not currently in a mental hospital, that does not mean you do not belong in one.

Just a couple of peripheral issues: first, I have been puzzling over your use of the word 'xian' (when I googled it I found that it refers either to a city in China or a 'basic unit of local government in China'). I was going to ask you about it, but I mentioned it to my wife first and she said, "silly, it's an abbreviation for 'Christian' just like 'xmas' is an abbreviation for Christmas" - maybe I do belong in a mental hospital ). Second, if someone makes a good point or says something I find funny am I allowed to give out + karma points? If so, how do I do it?

No No No No! Hell is a fucking terrible thing. How could you possibly not get that, from all I've said? Why did Jesus come and suffer it in our place, if not for the fact it's terrible?

I believe it's a reality. That doesn't make it a good, desirable or pleasant reality. What you're clearly not willing to contemplate is why it should even be a reality.

Oh, I contemplate it. But I have no understanding at all of why it WOULD be a reality, assuming that your god is both loving, and desiring that we are saved.

Because a place of eternal punsihment and torment that is as terrible as you describe is entirely disproportionate to any crime or sin that may be committed in a finite earthly life. Some punishment? Maybe. Depends on the crime. But unremitting torment for ever? No sir - no loving god could ever create such a place or deem it necessary or appropriate.

Especially when you examine the criteria for going there, which in the broad is "not accepting Christ".

I would have no problem in accepting Christ. He sounds like a generally OK dude, telling people to be nice to one another and not be so mean. I can get behind that, sure. But not because Christ said it, but because I think its a good way to be. The problem is that I can't accept Christ because I simply don't believe he exists, don't believe your god exists.

In most threads, the belief eventually comes down to "I had a personal experience, and so I believed" - making the belief something out of the control of the person experiencing it. And that's the problem I have with hell - that because I was not given this personal experience, I will be tormented forever for something out of my control.....and there is NO way I can square that with a necessary and terrible hell.

Further, those personal experiences fly in the face of any kind of "belief without proof", of any kind of faith. For true faith to exist, you would have to have that faith, keep that faith, in a life entirely bereft of any feeling of connection, any feeling of relationship, any "awareness" of that god. Because although I wouldn't accept your personal experience as evidence for ME to believe, I accept that it is evidence for YOU. Sufficient evidence for you to be convinced of the actuality of your god.

And therein lies the problem. Some people HAVE enough evidence for their god.....but many others don't. Yet when I ask "why not?", when I ask why god doesn't simply reveal himself to everyone and make it clear that he exists, the response is invariably "because then you wouldn't have faith, you would KNOW". Well, so far as I can see, all the experiences you have had mean that you DO "know". You have long gone past faith without any evidence, and are operating from a position of knowledge: knowledge that you cannot share with anyone else, sure, but nonetheless you are certain there is a god. You don't believe, you know....and hence remove any validity for that god not granting that knowledge to every human on the planet, and hence removing the possibility of hell for unbelief.

So no - I cannot conceive of any reason why a loving god who wants us to be saved would ever have the need to create and eternal, terrible, necessary hell.

The problem is that I can't accept Christ because I simply don't believe he exists, don't believe your god exists. ...

Just a quick correction, which may impact the rest - according to magicmiles, you aren't telling the truth here. He knows, and you don't, that deep down you really do believe magicmiles' god exists and are just denying it for some reason.

The only reason anyone will be tortured is because they are removed from the presence of God. Goodness and love come only from God. We weren't created to live apart from God. The suffering we have in the world right now is because we tried to live apart from God from the first, and continue to do so. The only reason its bearable, and even enjoyable for some, is because God has not yet removed Himself from the world.

But of course, all of this ASSUMES your theology (aka - assumes your interpretation of the bible - which you accepted "on faith" in the first place). Who "removes" these people from the presence of God (and throws them into the "lake of fire")? Isn't it (supposedly) the same guy who created it all - and knew from the beginning exactly what would take place? So then, he planned it (and wanted it to happen that way) and for some credulous reason, you bought it.

Yet all of this theological mumbo jumbo is a red herring to this discussion. And what more is there to talk about if you aren't even willing to admit that you could be wrong regarding this assumed interpretation you have made?

Nobody on earth deserves eternal punishment. Not a single person. Not Atilla the Hun, not Genghis Khan, not Hitler, not Stalin, not Pol Pot, not Idi Amin, not Osama bin Laden, not Benny Hill. Not even George Bush.

Because nobody can deserve to suffer eternally for something they did during a finite lifetime. That would be worse than anything they did while they were alive. If I could send people who have done horrible things to hell for a day, or a month, or a year, I would. But not forever. How could that possibly be just?

And to send people to eternal damnation (along with the Stalins and the Maos and the Osamas) just for picking the wrong team-- or not picking a team at all-- in the grand religion tournament? Absurd. Completely bollocks,[1] and nothing that a god-being worth worshipping would ever do. If I can figure that out, why can't so many religious folks?

Second, if someone makes a good point or says something I find funny am I allowed to give out + karma points? If so, how do I do it?

You may once you have reached a threshold number of posts. It is currently set at 50. The reason for that is we have had idiots come in, make one or two highly inflamatory posts, dole out a whole lot of negative points and then vanish. We want to make sure you are part of the community before you can sling the Darwins.

The problem is that I can't accept Christ because I simply don't believe he exists, don't believe your god exists. ...

Just a quick correction, which may impact the rest - according to magicmiles, you aren't telling the truth here. He knows, and you don't, that deep down you really do believe he exists and are just denying it for some reason.

This is actually a very funny position for Christians (and/or apologists) to take - but it is one which I used to take myself. How does the Christian know that God is 'known to all' but that some reject it? He assumes the bible! Specifically, he assumes Paul's writings in Romans chapter 1 are "God's Word" (as well as the rest of his interpretation of those writings).

But this doesn't take the conversation very far at all - and in fact it really demonstrates quite clearly what I set out to show from the beginning on this OP - namely that Christians are completely closed-minded. They are absolutely unwilling to entertain the possibility (or any scenario) where their belief system could be falsified. And so, when they enter this discussion and begin to discuss the topic, they quickly move away from the topic because their intention is quite dishonest. They have no intention of revealing a clear method of falsification for their alleged "faith", and this is because they don't really care whether or not their beliefs are actually true. They just want to believe what they want to believe because they want to believe.

But this doesn't take the conversation very far at all - and in fact it really demonstrates quite clearly what I set out to show from the beginning on this OP - namely that Christians are completely closed-minded. They are absolutely unwilling to entertain the possibility (or any scenario) where their belief system could be falsified. And so, when they enter this discussion and begin to discuss the topic, they quickly move away from the topic because their intention is quite dishonest. They have no intention of revealing a clear method of falsification for their alleged "faith", and this is because they don't really care whether or not their beliefs are actually true. They just want to believe what they want to believe because they want to believe.

This does not apply to me. I suspect many writings were made up or deliberately "colored" in translation for political reasons and to sustain patriarchy and domination of their culture. I think the men who picked what is included in the bible were politically motivated. I do not debate it because I cannot prove it. I do not discuss reasoning behind my faith because I recognize it is not rational. But my mind is far from closed. I just stay out of the crossfire of debates that I don't have the chops for.

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It doesn't make sense to let go of something you've had for so long. But it also doesn't make sense to hold on when there's actually nothing there.

I'm curious, and have asked before, what magicmiles' reasoning process was in determining that that part of Romans 1 is 100% true, without question. Just because it was included in Biblical canon?

If so, then what could have ever conceivably been put in there that he wouldn't have believed? Let's say it said that humanity's population is bound never to exceed 100 million. Would he be bound, today, to keep believing that because it is in Biblical canon?

Not at all. I believe that my sense of justice, right and wrong exist because I was created in God's image

That is completely non-scriptural. You, my funny accented friend, are a heretic[1] and possibly a blasphemer[2]. According to scripture, your sense of morality comes from Eve taking the initiative and eating the magical fruit from the magical Tree of Moral Knowledge and then feeding it to her slow witted mate. It gave them moral knowledge equal to that of the gods.

I don't know what that means. God was the first to experience g&L? god made g&l like the chinese make conterfeit Gucci bags? g&l are created within god like honey in a beehive and somehow it is piped in to us, like the public water system? Please explain.

Where? In what way? This relates to the previous question. Please define your model of how this all works. Are g&L things? Is there a Lake of Goodness, a warehouse with boxes of Love? If so, where? Does that mean we need god to create Anger and Badness too (because they must also exist)?

Please explain this, because right now I am completely baffled as to how you think this works.

So i guess I could ask, does the love you feel for Mrs Screwtape come from you, or from the first sentinent being that for some reason felt love?

Me. I have no idea how it could come from a primodial ancestor.

Does the pain you feel from smashing your thumb with a hammer come from you or god? Does the embarrassment you feel from having your pant's seams ripped come from you or god?Does the hurt from a loved one dying come from you or from god?

This does not apply to me. I suspect many writings were made up or deliberately "colored" in translation for political reasons and to sustain patriarchy and domination of their culture. I think the men who picked what is included in the bible were politically motivated. I do not debate it because I cannot prove it. I do not discuss reasoning behind my faith because I recognize it is not rational. But my mind is far from closed. I just stay out of the crossfire of debates that I don't have the chops for.

So you're basing your entire life on a belief that is 'not rational'?? I appreciate your honesty here, but why on earth would you ever do this (especially with such an important question)?

In the meantime, what I know of God and what I know of my own very, very dark heart is enough to tell me God is a God of love first and foremost, but is also a God of justice. It's our desire to set the level of the justice that is the problem.

But is that true? Is your heart really "very, very dark?" You don't strike me as a bad person. You don't seem mean, you don't seem cruel, you don't appear to be a malicious person. You come across as someone who tries to do well by others and give a good accounting of himself. Perhaps you see yourself as lacking in worth when compared to god, but the god you describe as loving and just seems to me to fall pretty far short of the example you set by trying to be a good person.

I find god to be the one with a very dark heart; he offers a very black-and-white reward system even though an extremely small number of people can ever be described as wholly evil or wholly good. I wonder where the cut-off is for making it into heaven, sometimes. For the JWs, it doesn't matter how good a person you are or how moral a life you lead. If you reject their teachings, you die and cease to exist forever, while they (even the obnoxious ones) enjoy a life of peace and joy forever. This is one of the things about religion that I couldn't make sense of, the extremes of reward and punishment for a population that almost never acts in extremes.

This does not apply to me. I suspect many writings were made up or deliberately "colored" in translation for political reasons and to sustain patriarchy and domination of their culture. I think the men who picked what is included in the bible were politically motivated. I do not debate it because I cannot prove it. I do not discuss reasoning behind my faith because I recognize it is not rational. But my mind is far from closed. I just stay out of the crossfire of debates that I don't have the chops for.

So you're basing your entire life on a belief that is 'not rational'?? I appreciate your honesty here, but why on earth would you ever do this (especially with such an important question)?

Because I don't base my entire life on it. I'm not a very good Christian in that respect. I'm into the serving others and doing unto others as you would yourself part. There is a lot of wisdom even if it is made up. There is also made up wisdom in Shakespeare and Harry Potter and other fiction. But the hellfire and condemnation not so much. I know my arguments don't stand up. This is why I don't argue.

I'm into the serving others and doing unto others as you would yourself part. There is a lot of wisdom even if it is made up.

Yet it never came from Christianity. So your belief in a god is moot. You and I and the rest of humanity are social animals, the ethics of reciprocity (golden rule) is innate in us all. If it wasn't we would have died out as species long ago. You don't need a belief in god to be human.

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We theists have no evidence for our beliefs. So no amount of rational evidence will dissuade us from those beliefs. - JCisall

It would be pretty piss poor brainwashing, if the victims knew they were brainwashed, wouldn't it? - Screwtape. 04/12/12